


September Song

by esteoflorien



Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-04
Updated: 2013-11-04
Packaged: 2017-12-31 11:14:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1031039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/esteoflorien/pseuds/esteoflorien
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Contemporary AU) Our four favorite ladies find love at Downton, a London jazz club.</p>
            </blockquote>





	September Song

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PerilouslyClose](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PerilouslyClose/gifts).



**_Wednesday_ **

**I  
Rosamund**

            She knows they come to see her. They come for her music: some, because they love it; others, because they think it’s cool to like it, even if they’ve never heard of Ella and Billie and the voices who fill Rosamund’s head on the nights when she doesn’t sing. They fill the little dark club to the brim, older couples and foursomes who sit and smoke and drink at the tables; young people passing in and out standing in the rear, all of them hipsters who hold their martinis and Manhattans and Instagram pictures of their vintage drinks. She amuses herself between songs watching Vera make their drinks, rolling her eyes all the while at each twenty-something who asks for a drink with a recipe that predates their grandparents. _I wish they’d just go back to cosmopolitans, myself,_ Vera tells her, those nights when she feels like talking.

            Tonight they’re playing _September Song_ , because it’s getting late in the year, she tells the crowd  – _those golden days are leaving us_ , she says, in the scripted introduction she’s recited too many times to count – but mostly because it’s the only song that she’s ever sung during which Vera has paid her any mind. It suits the huskiness of her lower register, and shows off her range. She knows which verse Vera loves, and she peers through the smoke and squints through the poor lighting to try to catch her eye. _And the days dwindle down to a precious few_ , she croons, and Vera glances away from whatever lonely heart she’s currently counseling. She catches Vera’s eye, and smiles; Vera lifts her chin and tosses her hair with just a hint of a smile, Rosamund tells herself, turning back to her audience. Or perhaps it was just a trick of the light.

**II  
Sarah**

            Sarah O'Brien has been coming to this club for years; she’s a regular, the kind of customer they count on. She’s come to know its characters intimately, as well as she knows the grooves in the wood of the bar at her preferred spot. Most of all she knows Vera, who is perhaps the least personable bartender she’s ever encountered. Although Vera has the look of a woman who’s had a hard life, with her piercing blue eyes and dark hair, she is beautiful, and if nothing else, Sarah O’Brien can recognize a beautiful woman. _This_ particular beautiful woman was in love with the moderately talented lounge singer who crooned standards and showtunes on Wednesday and Friday nights, which had a rather disheartening impact on Sarah’s attempts to drown her own sorrows. Listening to Vera’s sorry tale of unrequited love – _so close, yet so far!_ she'd say, with no small degree of melodrama – is hardly what she wants to do after a long day at the office, but they’re friends of a sort now.

            Rosamund Painswick – which Sarah is absolutely convinced is _not_ her real name – is hardly the best singer Downton had ever engaged, but she is beautiful. Vera is utterly, sickeningly smitten.

            “Vera!” she snaps, when she can’t get the woman’s attention. “Honestly.”

            “Fuck off, Sarah,” Vera retorts, and they fall silent while Vera mixes her drink.

            “She’s pretty,” Vera says, in that tone that says she’s utterly convinced she’s found the love of Sarah’s life. She tilts her head to a tall woman sat further down the bar. “And _lonely_.”

            Sarah rolls her eyes.

            “The golden days are leaving us,” Rosamund croons, and Sarah almost chokes on her whiskey sour. _Not again_.

            “For god’s sake, Vera,” she says. “Talk to her. She’s singing that damn song again.”

**_Friday_ **

**III  
Cora**

            She doesn’t know why she’s bothered wasting another night at Downton. It wasn’t as if she met anyone on Wednesday; the drinks were mediocre and the music enjoyable, if not exactly original. But the singer had a lovely voice, and Cora wanted to give her another chance, if not the club itself. That was her job, after all: the only heir to her father’s fortune, she’d managed to marginally contribute to the Levinson Audio Group by scouting out new talent for the label. If this Rosamund livened up her set tonight, perhaps she’d call her in for a meeting.

            “Long Island tea,” she tells the bartender, who shoots her a disbelieving look. “I’m from New York,” she adds, which seems to please the other woman.

            “What’s a pretty lady like you doing here?”

            Cora laughs and takes a sip of her drink, and simply doesn’t answer. Eventually the bartender gets the picture and moves away, back to a surly-looking woman who seems to be a friend of sorts, sat with her suit jacket tossed on the seat beside her and her blouse open at the neck. Cora looks away when she realizes she’s been staring.

            Behind her, Rosamund has begun the night with a far more promising song: _Sous le ciel de Paris_ , an older choice, but an interesting, unexpected one, and French chanson is having a moment, after all.

            “Excuse me,” says the woman from down the bar. “I just noticed that you’re alone, and so am I.”

            Cora turns towards her. “So I am,” she says, after a moment. “Please, sit down.”

            “Sarah O’Brien,” the woman says, settling in beside her. She's prettier than Cora expected.

            “Cora Levinson,” she replies. How easily her maiden name has returned to her.

            “Nice to meet you.” 

            “Yes,” Cora says, “it is.”

**IV  
Vera**

             Rosamund seems to have taken Vera’s suggestion that she vary the setlist to heart. Vera has no idea what she’s saying, but the music is captivating, and Rosamund seems to practically caress each syllable of the foreign language.

            Sarah takes to the pretty American well enough, Vera observes, with no small degree of jealousy, watching them ready themselves to leave. As they leave, the American leaves her card for Rosamund. _Cora Levinson, agent_ , it reads. _Cora_ has got about six inches on Sarah, but Sarah ushers her protectively from the bar, her arm at Cora’s waist.

            Rosamund comes to the bar after close as she always does, watching Vera set everything to rights. “I saw your friend left with someone,” she says.   

“Yeah,” Vera replies. “An American, an agent – she left you her card, wants you to call her.”

            “Did you like the music tonight?” she asks, tucking the card into her purse.

            “Very much,” Vera replies. It’s true.

            Rosamund smiles broadly. “I’d hoped you would.”

            “Yeah?” Vera says, and kicks herself.

            “Most nights I just want you to like it.”

            “I do,” Vera says, earnestly. “I do. I like your music, and you.”

             “Half the time I don’t even think you notice me.”

            “I notice you,” Vera says. “Don’t doubt that.”

            Rosamund coughs. “It’s the smoke,” she says, after a moment. “Bad for my voice.”

            “Let’s take a walk, then?” Vera asks.  She steps around the bar. “I’m done for the night.”

            “I can’t think of anything I’d like more,” Rosamund replies, and together they leave Downton, stepping out into the cold for a meandering walk to the Tube. But when Rosamund’s hand slips into Vera’s pocket to find hers, silently saying _I want to stay with you_ , Vera finds herself warmed by the most beautiful kind of possibility. 

**Author's Note:**

> Those who know me know that I LOVE to work with constraints. Each drabble in this quartet is exactly three hundred words long.


End file.
